MSCE commissioner arrested for 'scam' in teachers' eligibility test

The commissioner of Maharashtra State Council Of Examination MSCE and another person have been arrested for allegedly taking money to tamper with results of the Teachers Eligibility Test TET held last year Pune Police said on FridayThe malpractices in the TET held in January 2020 came to light during the probe of paper leak in the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority MHADA recruitment examination said city police commissioner Amitabh GuptaMSCE commissioner Tukaram Supe and one Abhishek Sawrikar an advisor with the education department were arrested by the cyber cell of city police on Thursday following questioning he addedSupe in connivance with Sawrikar and two others allegedly took money to change the results of some candidates so that they could clear the testThe cyber police recovered over Rs 88 lakh in cash gold jewelry and incriminating documents from Supes possession Gupta saidDuring the investigation of MHADA paper leak we had arrested Pritesh Deshmukh director of GA Software which was responsible for conducting the exam and agent Santosh HarkalDuring the probe malpractices in the TET came to light Gupta saidGA Software was also responsible for conducting the TETAlso read Maharashtra govt engineer among 2 held for demanding brideSupe and Sawrikar with the help of Deshmukh and Harkal allegedly received between Rs 35000 to 1 lakh from each candidate increased their marks and made them eligible Gupta saidAs per preliminary estimates the accused had received over Rs 4 crore from the candidates the police commissioner saidA police release claimed that the accused confessed that Supe had received Rs 170 crore while Deshmukh and Sawrikar had received Rs 125 crore eachAsked if Pune Police will probe other past examinations where GA Software was involved Gupta said if anything suspicious was found police will definitely look into itSpeaking about the modus operandi allegedly adopted by Supe and others Gupta said the candidates from whom money was received were asked to keep theirOMR optical mark recognition sheets and it was filled with right options just before they were sent for scanningThe MSEC had issued a notice to GA Software for not adhering to the norms such as producing CCTV footage of OMR sheet scanning police saidGA Software had been also blacklisted but Supe removed the firm from the list the release claimedSupe and Sawrikar were sent in police custody till December 17 by a local court on Friday it addedThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever